Squares of Tropic Summer

Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 2023| 6-9pm | Free-To-Attend
Friday, November 3, 2023 – Sunday, December 17, 2023
Presented in Black Box, Curated by The Black Box Committee

About the Exhibition

The Wardian case is an early type of terrarium that allowed the transportation of plants overseas throughout the XIX century, between empires and its colonies. A 1:1 scale cardboard model of a Wardian Case is manufactured by mail received during March-April quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This model is dragged to Bartram’s garden (Philadelphia, USA), one of the first botanical gardens in the US and a place where the case was used.

About the Artist

Valentina Soto Illanes (b. 1988, Santiago, Chile) lives and works in Santiago, Chile. She received her BFA from Universidad Católica de Chile (2011), and a Master in Fine Arts from Universidad de Chile (2015) and from the University of Pennsylvania. Solo exhibitions include De lejos se arma: ejercicios de recorte (Galería Bech, Santiago, Chile. 2012). Group exhibitions include: Superficies en suspenso (TIM arte contemporáneo, Santiago, Chile. 2022), Erasures and Accumulations (Grizzly Grizzly, Philadelphia, USA. 2021), Wants and Needs (EFA Project Space, New York, USA. 2021), Double Feature, (Icebox Project Space, Philadelphia, USA. 2021), Te llevo para que me lleves (Munar artes, Buenos Aires, Argentina. 2018), Crónicas de lo ajeno (Galería Gabriela Mistral, Santiago, Chile. 2016). She’s been part of the residencies: Flora (Bogotá, Colombia.2015), R.A.R.O. (Buenos Aires, Argentina. 2018), Vermont Studio Center (Vermont, USA. 2019), LabVerde (Manaus, Brazil. 2019) and Gasworks (London, UK, 2022). Valentina received the Dedalus Foundation MFA Fellowship in 2020 (NYC, USA).